Samsung Galaxy S4 preview: Take two

Synthetic benchmarks

The Samsung Galaxy S4 we're previewing is the one with the Snapdragon 600 chipset. We're as curious as you are to know about the Exynos 5 Octa, but we'll have to wait for wider benchmark support anyway.

Still, four Krait 300 cores clocked at 1.9GHz with 2GB of RAM and Adreno 320 GPU should offer top notch performance.

The Galaxy S4 edges out the HTC One and LG Optimus G Pro in single-threaded (Benchmark Pi) and multi-threaded (Linpack) performance, both these handsets use the same chipset but with the CPU clocked at 1.7GHz.

Benchmark Pi

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  134
• LG Optimus G Pro
  147
• HTC One
  151
• Sony Xperia Z
  264
• HTC Butterfly
  266
• Oppo Find 5
  267
• HTC One X+
  280
• LG Optimus G
  285
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  305
• HTC One X (Tegra 3)
  330
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  350
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  359
• Meizu MX 4-core
  362
• Nexus 4
  431

Linpack

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  749
• LG Optimus G Pro
  743
• HTC One
  646
• Sony Xperia Z
  630
• HTC Butterfly
  624
• LG Optimus G
  608
• Oppo Find 5
  593
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  214.3
• Nexus 4
  213.5
• Meizu MX 4-core
  189.1
• HTC One X+
  177.7
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  175.5
• HTC One X
  160.9
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  141.5

Geekbench 2 is a cross-platform benchmark, which allows us to compare the Galaxy S4 against the iPhone 5 and the difference is double. The HTC One and Optimus G Pro lag behind the S4 too, though we should not that they are using an older version of Android (4.1.2 vs. 4.2.2).

Geekbench 2

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  3227
• LG Optimus G Pro
  3040
• HTC One
  2708
• Sony Xperia Z
  2173
• HTC Butterfly
  2143
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1845
• LG Optimus G
  1723
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  1661
• iPhone 5
  1601

Moving on to compound benchmarks, AnTuTu puts the Galaxy S4 on top while Quadrant found basically no difference between the S4 and the G Pro (but the HTC One somehow lagged behind).

AnTuTu

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  23607
• HTC One
  22678
• Sony Xperia Z
  20794
• LG Optimus G Pro
  20056
• HTC Butterfly
  19513
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  15547
• Oppo Find 5
  15167

Quadrant

Higher is better

• LG Optimus G Pro
  12105
• Samsung Galaxy S4
  12028
• HTC One
  11746
• Sony Xperia Z
  8075
• HTC One X+
  7632
• LG Optimus G
  7439
• Oppo Find 5
  7111
• HTC One X
  5952
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  5916
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  5450
• Meizu MX 4-core
  5170
• Nexus 4
  4567

Now let's look at the GPU benchmarks. We ran GLBenchmark 2.5 in 1080p off-screen mode, which is also the native screen resolution for the flagships. The Galaxy S4 came out ahead of the HTC One here, which leads us to suspect that the GPU has been overclocked too.

The S4 also topped the Epic Citadel chart, though it's getting too close to the software 60fps limit to show much of a difference. Still, this benchmark uses Unreal Engine, which is sometimes used in high-end 3D mobile games and shows real-world performance.

GLBenchmark 2.5 Egypt (1080p off-screen)

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  40
• HTC One
  34
• Asus Padfone 2
  31
• Oppo Find 5
  30
• Sony Xperia Z
  29
• LG Optimus G
  29
• HTC Butterfly
  27.9
• Apple iPhone 5
  27
• Nexus 4
  26
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  17
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  15
• HTC One X+
  12
• HTC One X
  9

Epic Citadel

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4
  57
• HTC One
  56.4
• Sony Xperia Z
  55.6
• LG Optimus G Pro
  54.2
• Nexus 4
  53.9
• Asus Padfone 2
  53.4
• LG Optimus G
  52.6
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  41.3
• Oppo Find 5
  38.6

Finally, JavaScript and HTML5 performance proved good but not as good as Samsung managed with the Galaxy Note II. We used the Android Browser for the test rather than Chrome, which also comes preinstalled.

SunSpider

Lower is better

• Samsung Ativ S
  891
• Apple iPhone 5
  915
• Nokia Lumia 920
  910
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  972
• HTC One X+
  1001
• LG Optimus G Pro
  1011
• Motorola RAZR i XT890
  1059
• Samsung Galaxy S4
  1089
• HTC One
  1124
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1192
• Meizu MX 4-core
  1312
• Sony Xperia Z
  1336
• LG Optimus G
  1353
• HTC Butterfly
  1433
• Nexus 4
  1971
• Oppo Find 5
  2045

Vellamo

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  2418
• HTC One
  2382
• Sony Xperia Z
  2189
• HTC One X (Tegra 3)
  2078
• Samsung Galaxy S4
  2022
• HTC Butterfly
  1866
• Oppo Find 5
  1658
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1641
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  1568
• LG Optimus G
  1522
• Meizu MX 4-core
  1468
• Nexus 4
  1310